Rau gets first Red Star goal

4 February 2025

Kunlun Red Star 1 Avtomobilist Yekaterinburg 2 OT

Kyle Rau kept up a family tradition as he potted his first goal in the KHL. Rau, whose older brother Chad scored 20 goals in our first season, opened his account in his fifth appearance for the Dragons.

Kyle’s marker, early in the third period, was an important one. It cancelled out Avtomobilist’s opener and took this game to overtime. That alone secured our first point since we beat Traktor a week ago. However, it wasn’t enough to lead us to victory: Avtomobilist grabbed an OT goal to extend its hot streak to 11 games.

There were no goals in the first period, but no shortage of chances for our guys. Danny O’Regan had a good look early on, then Yaroslav Likhachyov hit the post. Later, Austin Wong created a chance for Alexander Sharov before engineering an opening for himself. Wong’s shot beat Vladimir Galkin but whistled past the post.

The Dragons had Stepan Zvyagin back in the line-up today, and he was involved in our best moment of the second period. His cross-ice feed dropped invitingly for Likhachyov to shoot at the open side of Galkin’s net, but the young forward fired wide.

Finally, those missed chances caught up with our guys. Avtomobilist hadn’t exactly looked like an overwhelming offensive force, but the danger from their forwards is well known. When Andrei Obidin got a chance five minutes before the second intermission, he found the net to make it 1-0.

Oftentimes this season, Avtomobilist has proved difficult to break down when defending a lead in the third period. But a power play chance for Red Star opened the way to a tying goal after three minutes of the final stanza. Jan Drozg whipped in a shot that was too hot for Galkin to handle, and Rau was on hand to stuff it over the line with the goalie disoriented.

That gave a foundation for the Dragons to attack and, in the closing stages, we had the better chances to win in regulation. Nick Merkley’s tripping penalty helped, and we saw Rau close to his second of the night before Sharov’s late shot from an acute angle found the side netting.

And so to the extras. At the start of the season in Yekaterinburg, we got the win in a shoot-out. And, generally, overtime hasn’t been bad for us this season: our most recent victory over Traktor came in OT, and of 11 previous games that went past 60 minutes, we had won seven.

On this occasion, however, everything went against us. An interference call on Likhachyov opened the door for Avtomobilist and a four-on-three power play helped Anatoly Golyshev grab the winning goal.

Today’s loss, coupled with Torpedo’s shoot-out win over Vityaz, means we now have seven points to make up on eighth place. But the fight goes on: Thursday’s home game with Dynamo promises an All-Star goaltending duel between Jeremy Smith and Vladislav Podyapolsky.

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